Chapter 2 #2
The sun was setting by the time they rode into the camp.
The others had lit the central campfire, and the smell of cooking beans and cabbage was thick in the air. Cabbage seemed to grow well no matter the soil, so they ate a lot of that lately.
Andrew brought the cart to a halt just before the semicircle of fourteen tents by the fire. One was a communal kitchen, twelve were occupied, and one had been erected just for Julie. His heart beat fast in his chest and he was suddenly nervous. Would she like it?
“This is your tent,” Andrew said, as he helped her with her things.
Julie lifted the flap and peered inside. “It looks adequate, thank you.”
He smiled, relieved. He was about to comment that he hoped to someday soon build her a much more comfortable house, when a voice rang out.
“Hey, Andy, you’re back!”
Troy came loping over, wearing an apron over his work trousers and shirt. His hair was standing on end, and he had a smear of something dark on his cheek.
“Troy Wellan, I’d like you to meet Julie Tully,” Andrew said. “Uh, I mean Julie Carter. We got married this afternoon.” It felt strange to say that, but seeing the faint blush on Julie’s cheeks made him flush slightly too.
Troy grinned. “Well, pleased to meet you. And congratulations.” He offered Julie his hand.
She accepted and they shook hands.
“Troy is our mechanic,” Andrew said. “He’s amazing with pulleys and ropes and complicated things that I don’t fully understand.
” He chuckled as he spoke. It was the nerves.
Showing Julie his world was proving more nerve-wracking than he had thought it would be.
It seemed that she accepted it already, which was a miracle in his eyes, but it turned out that he wanted her to also like it. He hadn’t fully expected that.
“Right now, I’m the cook. We take turns,” Troy said. “I hope you like chicken and bean casserole made with cabbage and carrots. They’re all we’ve managed to grow at the moment. I’d better get back to it, before our meal burns.”
“Where is everyone else?” Julie asked as Troy walked away. “The place is empty.”
“They’ll be in the mine or on their way back to camp,” Andrew said.
“Where is the mine?”
“I’ll show you in the morning,” Andrew said. “For now, why don’t you get yourself settled?”
He left her in her tent looking around. She had uprooted her whole life to come out here, and no matter how cheerful and stoic she was, he knew he needed to give her some time to settle in.
The mine was about five hundred yards from the far edge of camp.
Andrew had done that on purpose because the entrance was a vertical shaft that went down over three hundred feet before hitting the cave floor.
This meant the ground in this area wasn’t the most stable, and the last thing he wanted was for the camp to fall into a sinkhole.
The rig that Troy had set up was a tripod pulley system that allowed men to climb in and out of the hole. At the moment they were just collecting some samples, tracking the ore through the rock, plotting the cave system, and planning where to sink more shafts to follow the copper.
People thought that mines were easy. Like a person found some ore just sitting there and it was a matter of picking it up.
Andrew had foolishly thought the same before he got started in the business.
There was digging and blasting and hacking involved—and that was just to get the rock loose.
Then there was transporting it to the surface, crushing and purifying it, and smelting it into a form that could be sent back east to the factories to be burned.
All of that took planning, patience, and a lot of people working together. Andrew was in charge of it all, and it was a lot to carry. Especially considering who their financier was. The mere thought made Andrew’s palms sweat, and he pushed that thought from his mind.
Almost halfway to the mine, he spotted his brother Jeff and others walking to the camp.
“Hey, you’re back,” Jeff said, throwing an arm around Andrew’s shoulders. “So? How is she?”
“She’s lovely,” Andrew said, his heart beating fast again at the thought of Julie.
“Lovely?” Michael walked up. He was Troy’s big brother, and his sandy hair stood on end just like Troy’s. “What does that mean?”
“It means that Julie is my wife now, and she’s great. We’ll see how she handles all of you,” Andrew said. “Be nice, fellows; she’s had a long journey.”
“We’re always nice,” Jeff said. “Hey, we opened up the western cavern today. The seam goes right through it like you said it would.”
Andrew smiled. “Good. Good.” He nodded. “Soon we’ll have to make the entrance bigger.”
“A lot bigger,” Michael commented. “We’re going to have to install an elevator. There’s no way we’ll be able to get the ore up otherwise.”
“We can talk to Troy about that,” Andrew said.
“Yes, later,” Jeff said. “Tonight, we celebrate. You’re a hitched man.” He slapped Andrew on the back and made him stumble a little. He was just pulling himself upright when the sound of a woman screaming filled the air.
Andrew’s heart dropped into the pit of his stomach, and he set off running as fast as he could.